The National Black Church Initiative is working with the Smithsonian Institute to help preserve and protect the history of the black church. This project will seek to raise funds to preserve the history of First African Baptist Church of Savannah, Georgia. This is our first project. Every year we will select a church to help them preserve the history of their church and important church records. NBCI will hire curators to teach church how to preserve and store records. The main focus of the project is to help preserve documents, photographs, architectural design, help restoring the historic structure through renovation and helping to document the history of the church and the importance of it to church history in general and the black church in particular.